“Right at the back of the narrow, deep gorge of round rocks, slippery like big, thick manatees, the water mass plunged down with thunderous noise”, Thomas Mann wrote about the Varone waterfall in his notes. The experience in the gorge with the waterfall in Varone, north of Riva, is even found a place in his novel “The Magic Mountain” as the waterfall in the Fluelatal.
The Magnone torrent rises from the clear Tennosee lake, plunges into the mountain and then reappears as a Varone waterfall. The entire Parco Grotta Cascata Varone complex, built by the Vittoriale architect Giancarlo Maroni, is an example of the blessing and curse of civilisation: the impressive natural phenomenon of the spraying, splashing and thundering waterfall is now staged in the gorge with lights and paths, signs and booths – and parts of the waterfall also feed a local power station.
Nevertheless, it is wonderful to climb the steps between the wet rocks of millions of years old Jurassic limestone, to stand in the spraying spray, to look up and to be impressed by the thundering masses of water and the bizarre rock formations. Trout also live here wild and, like native ferns, rare mountain plants.
Via Cascata 12
38060 Tenno
phone: +39 0464521421
daily 9.00 am - 7.00 pm (summer) 10.00 am - 5.00 pm (winter)
